Measurement of ¹⁹Ne Excited States Relevant to the ¹⁸F(p,α)¹⁵O Reaction in Classical Novae

The most prominent gamma-ray line emission in classical novae (511 keV) is created by the annihilation of ¹⁸F decay positrons. Thus, accurate abundance calculations of ¹⁸F are needed to model explosive nucleosynthesis to compare with observations and study the underlying stars in these stellar environments. Currently, the main uncertainties in these calculations involve the main destruction pathway of ¹⁸F: the ¹⁸F(p,α)¹⁵O reaction. The reaction rate of this destruction pathway remains uncertain due to proton branching ratios of higher lying states in the compound nucleus ¹⁹Ne, and J^π values of the sub- and near-threshold states in ¹⁹Ne. We performed a ¹⁹F(³He,t)¹⁹Ne transfer reaction using the Super Enge Split-Pole Spectrograph (SE-SPS) at the Fox Accelerator Laboratory at Florida State University in order to observe these states. Proton and alpha decays were collected by the Silicon Array for Branching Ratio Experiments (SABRE) in coincidence with the triton reaction products detected at the focal plane. I will present a preliminary data analysis of the collected coincidence data.